Zabid

Who holds it

Name

al-Mu'izz Isma'il ibn Tughtekin

Title

Ruler in residence

Since

1197

Confidence

high

Lord in 1200

al-Mu'izz Isma'il, who resides here; the town's own governor (wali) and qadi not pinned.

How things stand that morning

The sultan's seat and the richest town of the Tihama.

Charter

None known: Yemeni towns had no charters; the ruler's governor (wali), the judge (qadi) and the market inspector (muhtasib) answered to the sultan or the imam.

Council

No sworn council; the notables, the qadi and the headman speak for the town. Names for 1199-1200 not pinned.

Communities

Arabs of the Tihama (the Ash'ar among the old tribes of the district), Shafi'i and Hanafi scholars, Ayyubid soldiers and officials, slaves and freedmen of African origin (the Najahids were a dynasty of Abyssinian freedmen).

Fairs and markets

Weekly markets; the summer outings to the palm groves at the date harvest are described by later writers (Ibn al-Mujawir, 1220s).

Militia

Not recorded for 1199-1200.

Walls and castle

A walled town since the Ziyadid era with a palace-citadel; the circuit and gates in 1200 are not pinned (later sources name four gates: Bab Siham, Bab al-Shabariq, Bab al-Qurtub and Bab al-Nakhl).

Trade and crafts

Market of the Tihama: dates and grain of Wadi Zabid, cotton and indigo dyeing and weaving, trade with the highlands and the harbours.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. Rajab 598 (April 1202)Al-Mu'izz is killed at the gate; the Kurds and mamluks sack the town.Depends on: The revolt of the emirs. Stopped by: Its prevention.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: The town's history to 1174 is clear; for 1200 its role as the sultan's residence rests on the chronicles of al-Mu'izz's reign.

Primary sources for Ayyubid Yemen

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Complete History, Izz al-Din Ibn al-Athir (about 1200 to 1231, at Mosul). The widest Muslim narrative for the years 596 to 597 AH (1199 to 1201): al-Adil's entry into Cairo and his taking of the sultanate from his nephew al-Mansur Muhammad early in 1200, the quarrels of the Ayyubid princes at Damascus, Aleppo and Hama, the Nile failure and the great famine of Egypt, Mosul under Nur al-Din Arslan Shah and the Jazira under Gokbori and the Artuqids, Baghdad under the caliph al-Nasir, the Khwarazmshah Tekish's death in 1200 and Muhammad's accession, the Ghurid wars in Khurasan, the Eldiguzids and Georgia, the Almohads in the west, and the Seljuks of Rum in passing. Read online
• The Dispeller of Anxieties, on the History of the Ayyubids, Jamal al-Din Ibn Wasil (about 1272 to 1285, at Hama). The fullest Ayyubid dynastic history, written at Hama with access to the family's own tradition and to Ibn al-Athir, Ibn Abi Tayy and Sibt ibn al-Jawzi. Read online
• The Road to Knowledge of the Dynasties of Kings, Taqi al-Din al-Maqrizi (about 1400 to 1440, at Cairo). A late compilation, but for Ayyubid Egypt it keeps lost material: for 596 to 598 AH it records al-Adil's entry into Cairo, the removal of the boy al-Mansur Muhammad, the oath to al-Kamil as heir, the appointments at Cairo, the low Niles of 1199 and 1200 and the famine and plague of 1200 to 1202 with grain prices, the reports of cannibalism and the death tolls, together with Yemen, the Hijaz and the Mecca emirate. Read online
• History of Yemen, Umara al-Yamani (Umara ibn Ali al-Hakami) (1168 to 1174, at Cairo). The history of Yemen's dynasties to the eve of the Ayyubid conquest: the Ziyadids and Najahids of Zabid, the Sulayhids and their queen Arwa, the Zuray'ids of Aden, the Hamdanid sultans of San'a and the Mahdids of Zabid, with Umara's own career as a Yemeni envoy to Fatimid Cairo. Read online
• The Cairo Geniza Documents (about 950 to 1250 for the bulk of the historical documents). Letters, court records, accounts and lists from the Ben Ezra synagogue in Fustat that show the working of the trade that bound Egypt to Ifriqiya, Sicily, al-Andalus, Aden and India. Read online
• History of the Observant Traveller (A Traveller in Thirteenth-Century Arabia), Ibn al-Mujawir (Jamal al-Din Yusuf ibn Ya'qub) (about 1226 to 1232). A merchant-traveller's description of western and southern Arabia a generation after 1200: Mecca and the Hijaz ports, the Red Sea crossing, Zabid and the Tihama, Aden with its customs and tariffs, the Hadramawt coast, Dhofar and Oman, Socotra, and the opposite African shore at Zeila and the Dahlak islands. Read online
• Dictionary of Countries, Yaqut al-Hamawi (1224 to 1228, at Aleppo). An alphabetical gazetteer of every place Yaqut had read of or seen: he travelled as a bookseller's agent through Syria, Iraq, Persia, Khurasan and Khwarazm (about 1213 to 1220) and settled in Aleppo. Read online
• The History of the Observant Traveller: the pages on Zeila, Berbera, Mogadishu and Dahlak, Ibn al-Mujawir (Yusuf ibn Yaqub ibn al-Mujawir) (about 1221 to 1230). The closest description of the Horn's ports to 1200, written about twenty-five years later by a trader and official who worked the Aden trade: Zeila and its traffic in slaves, ivory and the goods of the Ethiopian interior; the Barbar (Somali) coast with Berbera and Mogadishu, and the sea route from Aden to Mogadishu and on to Kilwa with its sailing seasons; the Dahlak islands with their own sultan and his dues; Socotra; and the customs and prices of Aden under the Ayyubids of Yemen. Read online